


The Kissing Tree

by vivilove



Series: Valentine Moments [3]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, First Kiss, Valentine's Day Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-06
Updated: 2017-02-06
Packaged: 2018-09-22 08:00:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9594722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vivilove/pseuds/vivilove
Summary: This year they were going to kiss, their first kiss ever…on Valentine’s Day.





	

The tall Sentinel tree in Jon’s backyard had been dubbed the Climbing Tree since he and Robb had been six. It had low branches that made it easy to climb. Mr. Stark had helped the boys build a small treehouse (they preferred to call it a fort) about fifteen feet up when they were eight. Mr. Stark had also hung a swing from the tree below the fort. That was where Sansa had always wanted to play when the boys were up in their fort. She’d never been up in their fort before…not till now anyway.

“Is this alright?” he asked nervously after helping her climb up the tree.

It’d been a while since either him or Robb had been up here. It was a bit musty and stale with some cobwebs in the corners. She nodded before looking back down at her boots. It was Valentine’s Day. He was 12 years old and she was 11. He’d wanted to kiss her for a few months now but he was waiting for today because Sansa was…well, she was special and she liked romantic things and Jon thought maybe kissing her on Valentine’s Day for the first time made sense somehow. After all, they’d been each other’s Valentines the last two years.

The first year, she’d given him an anonymous note and a cherry sucker which he in turn had ended up giving back to her. He’d asked her to be his Valentine and that was pretty much it. He still had the note though.

Last year, he’d given her a pink carnation he’d bought at Castle Black Junior High for a dollar. The cheerleaders were selling them to raise money for a trip or new uniforms or something. He’d paid his dollar and hid it in his jacket and waited till he got home so he could give it to Sansa. She’d given him a little sandwich bag filled with chocolate candy kisses she’d swiped from Mrs. Stark’s pantry with a pink ribbon tied to it. All of this had happened in secret of course. He’d motioned for her to follow him to his house for a minute when he got off the bus on the pretense of giving her back a book he’d borrowed. He hadn’t wanted Robb to give him hell over it and really didn’t want Mr. or Mrs. Stark giving him the side-eye either. He’d barely been able to look at her as he handed her the flower but the way her eyes lit up when he did made him glad he had.

She’d sat on the front porch sniffing her carnation for nearly an hour after that while him and Robb and the younger Starks had a snowball fight. She’d told Robb some secret admirer gave it to her at school causing his best friend to scowl menacingly before Jon had hit him in the back of the head with a snowball to distract him. Jon said he was tired at one point so he could go sit next to her in the swing. He’d reached down and held her hand for about 30 seconds. They were both wearing gloves because it was cold but it felt nice to hold her hand and their hands pressed together started getting warm. But then Arya had run up on the porch and threw a snowball at him. She’d missed him though and hit Sansa. She usually got upset by things like that but that day she’d just laughed and that made Jon laugh, too.

Of course, this was different now. This year they were going to kiss, their first kiss ever…on Valentine’s Day. But, as they rode home on the bus together that afternoon and quietly made their plan to meet at the Climbing Tree after their homework was done, he began to doubt himself. It was a lot of pressure for a boy, he thought. _Do I have to close_ _my eyes? What if I miss her lips? What if she expects me to use my tongue? What if she thinks my breath stinks or...what if it’s just not everything she hoped for and I let her down?_

This year the weather was mild even though it was starting to get a bit dark out. He wasn’t even wearing a coat, just a sweater and jeans. He’d brought his camp lantern and his mom’s old portable radio down from the house. He set the lantern on the floor and tuned the radio to the station that played love songs all day.

_‘Kiss me, down by the broken treehouse,_

_Swing me, upon its hanging tire,_

_Bring, bring, bring your flowered hat,_

_We’ll take the trail marked on your father’s map’_

The song was a few years old but he recognized it. His mom liked to sing it sometimes. And he couldn’t argue that it seemed to fit well for this occasion.

“Sansa…” he said full of nerves and uncertainty. “Are you…you still want this?” he asked, wiping his sweaty palms on his jeans.

“Yes, Jon,” she answered, sounding partly giddy and partly nervous while she tugged at her earring.

 _Just do it_ … _just walk up to her and kiss her_ , he said to himself. He moved a bit closer to where she stood in the treehouse but froze the next moment when he heard voices on the ground beneath them. _Robb!_ he realized with mounting terror. _If he catches us up here together, he’ll know something’s up_. He looked over and saw his own panic clearly reflected on Sansa’s face…until another voice was heard.

“Why here, Robb?” a girl was asking. “This isn’t even your backyard.”

“Yeah but it has to be here. Besides, Jon would understand. Sit in the swing and I’ll push you.”

“So, what’s so special about here then?” she asked a moment later.

“Because this is the Kissing Tree, Jeyne.”

“The Kissing Tree? So, you’re telling me you’ve brought other girls here to push them in this swing and then kiss them?”

“No! I just thought it might be a romantic place for us to share a Valentine’s kiss. Jon and I used to call it the Climbing Tree but I think Kissing Tree sounds better now. Don’t you?”

The girl, Jeyne Westerling, from four doors down giggled and then they got quiet.

Jon looked over at Sansa and they both had to stifle their laughter at Robb’s romanticism. He grinned at her and she smiled shyly in return and swept a bit of her hair back over her shoulder. He swallowed hard then and moved a step closer. Her eyes went wide and her gaze became intense. Suddenly, he wasn’t thinking about Robb and Jeyne below now or the musty little fort they’d helped Mr. Stark build with scrap lumber when they were eight. She was here with him. She was expecting a kiss and he wanted to give it to her.

He crossed the two remaining paces between them and placed his hands on her shoulders. She started to put her hands on his arms and he pulled her a bit closer. He heard her breath catch when he did that and then he couldn’t think about anything else but that little sound she’d made. He leaned his head forward and his eyes closed just as he brushed his lips to hers, softly but with a gentle pressure…tenuous but full of longing.

He pulled back and opened his eyes to see Sansa still had her eyes closed and her lips sweetly puckered. He knew then that he’d never want to stop kissing her. Just as she started to open her eyes, he moved one hand down to her waist and leaned back in.

“Again,” he whispered, moving the other hand up to slide through all that pretty red hair.

Sansa smiled sweetly at him before their lips touched once more. This time their lips didn’t just brush against each other. They melded together with a kind of mounting urgency that made Jon’s stomach flop and flutter even more intensely than before. He caught a whiff of the peppermint gum she’d been chewing on the bus that afternoon and opened his mouth to push his tongue against her lips. She gasped and backed away a bit but he could tell by the way she smiled at him that she didn’t really mind. And maybe she wouldn’t mind if he tried that again sometime.

“Was that…okay?” he asked breathlessly.

“Yes,” she said with quiet sigh. “It was perfect, Jon.”

“Robb?” they heard Jeyne say from below. “Why do I hear music?”

And this time they didn’t manage to stifle their laughter.

**Author's Note:**

> Song lyrics from 'Kiss Me' by Sixpence None the Richer


End file.
